But Adam, what did you see from Alyssa Ahn and Weisheim of Washington?

I thought Alyssa Ahn was spectacular.

She was barely dropping games throughout the entire event.

And in particular, when you thought about how she started her season this fall in All-Americans, it was definitely, you know... a little watered down, but certainly was a blaze here.

So it's good to see her win.

I thought she played excellent beating Lexia Jacobs, who's always tricky with how big she strikes the ball.

Jermine Sharif, who we know has, you know, had a history of winning at multiple different schools now that she's transferred to Washington and is there for another year.

Adam, what'd you see from him? Talk to me about his run.

But what'd you make of, uh, Hercog? Because generally it wasn't a, a big splash for the Cal women's team at this event.

Yeah.

I think Hercog in particular, I think she was really nervous in that semifinal, and I think those nerves, like, showed, and you had Patry who's like after every ball, like, screaming like, "Vamos!" Like, and is just, like, in your face kind of getting really into the match, and you're just not a part of it.

I think she got ...

It looked like she got a little bit overwhelmed by just the amount of energy Patry was throwing at her, but it's ...

I think Hercog, you know, definitely the physicality of she's super tall like her brother, definitely loves, you know, to be able to move the serve around, has an excellent kick serve.

You know, has really bouncing balls.

Yeah.

Talk me through their runs, what we saw from them.

Well, Arsenal, pre-season number 30, had been playing at, in the top two spots for these Kentucky Wildcats.

I- you know, last year had established himself as definitely someone...

A, a freshman who you thought would have that sophomore surge energy coming in here.

And you know, making the semifinals is great.

He pushed Pascual the hardest of anybody.

[laughs] But still it wasn't enough to, to win a set.

What did you make, speaking of Texas, Oli Oy- Oyarcar?

no one holds this, like... as uh gospel but for that reason for i i do excuse the absence i do give an excused absence to get a wild card into a wta 125 in your home country there are not many events there in turkey and then you go and win a round or you make the semi-finals like you do get an excuse absence from the john parsons school

But yeah, so for iSchoolMert, who's played All-Americans every year.

This is the only year she hasn't played.

And D-Likely, who kind of burst onto the scene at All-Americans last year by coming through pre-qualifying to make it all the way to being a one-win away from qualifying for NCAAs last year.

Like, for them to not be there, I think Georgia established itself well.

I think I especially want to shout out Linnea Bayraliu, who came through qualifying, looked extremely impressive.

Had to go through with some challenging players, you know.

She did, unfortunately for her, fall in the round of 16 and in the consolation semifinals, but she did beat Vera Knighty of ASU, Caballero of TCU, Mushika of Cal, Pascal Skis, and she's joined by another ivy league player who had a decent run here um margot fantala of columbia the transfer from northwestern now she was two and eight in big ten play at number one but she will fit right in to the ivy league she gets another win over veronity she hates to see an ivy league player my gosh and then jana hassam as well your former ncaa semi-finalist so adam any other storylines or players that caught your eye

So she's certainly a player that you were looking for to see if she can establish herself as a top 10 mainstay here for the fall season.

Yeah, 100%.

She's definitely looking to anchor that top of the lineup for that NC State program as they continue to grow, and I think look really good and put themselves in good positions for the start of this, this fall season.

I also was happy to see the first te- I mean, this isn't technical, but collegiate appearance for Isabella Kruger.

Um, and she went three sets in all of her matches, lost to Lanton Antanasi both in third set tie breaks.

They didn't play full third sets, they just lost in 10-point, the, the 10-point tie break.

Um, so I was happy to at least see her, right? Um, 'cause I hadn't really gotten to see her play much yet in an Auburn shirt, so I'm just happy that she was able to make the appearance there.

It feels like that means she can play in the top four of a lineup and feel pretty comfortable there.

And so Adam, before we get into the specifics of who is ranked where, what are your thoughts on how these preseason rankings are done?

I think in essence, I think the singles, they get it right.

I think the way that they do this is correct because in reality, you know, the people who finished the, the rankings last year, if they are coming back, I think deserve that ranking or something similar.

I, I know there's no tennis in between in the summer and a lot of things can happen, but I think it's fair that they get just bumped up based on who is still returning.

That's where it falls, and then the WTN from there on out for the newcomers I think is fair.

We don't know how these players are gonna play in college.

They come in, they can come in with some sort of number assigned to them, but really when we see them in college is how we're gonna be able to compare them to the rest of the field because, you know, most of these college players are playing pretty much anywhere between 75% or more of their matches of the entire year in college versus other college players and not out on the pro circuit against a various, uh, plethora of opponents.

... what teams, like, really made marks in these rankings?

So is this enough to make up for the Ziranova loss?

It's interesting.

I'm not sure if it's good enough to make up.

I think it's definitely a step up in doubles.

Like this reminds me of like when they had Pransky, Nell Miller, um, Al- Alana Smith, and, uh, Anna Rogers all on like the same doubles roster, and you're just like, "These girls are crazy good at doubles" Like, they just, it was like literally unstoppable, a doubles point.

Like that's, that's what like this makes me think, 'cause Rosin Gileni, like she's, she's a fantastic doubles player, like fantastic.

And even if we don't see her in singles, I w- I mean, I wouldn't be surprised, but, um, that's the big part is Pursue's not gonna replace a Ziranova.

Adam, any other players or schools that caught your eye when you were following the transfer portal chaos?

I was gonna say, like, from first ball, but you really felt it even before that, didn't you?

Yeah.

I mean, it was the lull before Pepperdine and Ohio State finished.

You just saw people piling and piling and piling in, and then by the time UGA actually got started playing, it was a very, very packed crowd.

And it was basically just from the get-go, just, like, snap of the fingers, Georgia was there.

I mean, we had early breaks on two, on one and three, and you saw Patri Pouchide, like, pumping up that crowd.

Like, I don't know if I've ever seen a player this much, this animated just at the crowd.

By the way, that 6-2 set from Ziranova, best I've ever seen her play.

And then they got straight set at 1-2-5, and then 4 was the three-set match.

Yeah, 4 was the lone three-setter outside of also 3.

That was also another that went unfinished.

But these matches are going to be different.

Sell me on this one, because I just had a hard time with it.

well pitar jovanovich was down a set in his opening singles match return and i think will jansen has looked actually been one of the brighter spots for this uga team and while he did lose to jovanovich in that match it's might be a different jovanovich that we're going to look at here versus the one that was playing earlier so it's like if i'm like okay if georgia takes doubles again if they didn't start bill once they can totally take doubles again in starkville and then if jovanovich is not fully 100 percent Will Jansen can be up there too.

And then I'm like, okay, Noah Johnson's not going to play Vaxman again because Noah Johnson's now bumped up to four.

Tell me more about number five.

Do you think I'm missing any?

I...

Think for the seeds, I don't think you're necessarily missing it.

It was really quiet on the women's side.

Just in general, through the first two rounds, there's some deep separation generally between the upper echelon of women's versus the men right now in terms of the drama.

For the first two rounds, we knew that we were going to get probably more drama in the Sweet 16 and the quarterfinals.

So I think these were definitely the main takeaways.

Cal beating Kentucky, Clemson beating Ole Miss, and Cornell beating Arkansas.

Adam, how do you see this playing out, and what makes this Florida team dangerous?

This Florida team has kind of been on the quiet ascent pretty much this entire back half of the SEC season ever since they beat really Vandy at home 4-4-0, and it was a very comfortable win.

You know, them even taking the top two courts versus Vandy.

Like, Florida's really been on a little bit of a surge, and they were your dark horse pick for the SEC tournament, and honestly, even though they didn't get the win versus Auburn, they did challenge Auburn.

They did take doubles against an Auburn team that has been excellent in doubles all season in a tournament that Auburn did end up winning, and they took, they pushed four courts to three sets, like, and even had a set point on one of the courts that they lost in straights at the number two spot with Ganina against Khurutseva.

So I think that this Florida team can definitely make matches interesting, and I think that they've really embraced this new underdog mindset of, like, "Look, like, we've been basically counted out all season, like, us going to Michigan.

Michigan just won the Big Ten championships." Like, uh, they don't, I don't think they really care who they play, and I think that they're gonna kind of embrace going to Michigan, especially, you know, if this match is outdoors.

This is a really good region, but what's your, um, what you need to see from this number six seed?